Honoré Morrow

“ Snow flew. The buck fence crashed. The bulls bellowed, locked horns, retreated, charged, slipped, fell, rose again with a rapidity only equalled by the ferocity of the attack.
"They'll kill each other if they aren't stopped!" cried Fowler. "Stop them, Douglas! O God, what a place! What a place!"
"What a fight, you mean!" laughed Charleton. "I put up ten dollars on
Sioux."
"Take you!" said Scott.
"If Spencer's bull kills mine, he'll pay for it!" cried Nelson.
"If they work into the corral," shouted Douglas, "some of you help me put up the fence again and we'll have them!" ”

“ Cattle bellowed as if in disconsolate protest against the ruthless on-march of winter. Douglas, in spite of the last few words with Peter, was in a curiously uplifted frame of mind which for some time he could not dissect. Part of it he knew to be relief from the sudden suspicion that had overwhelmed him, but he was half-way home before he told himself that Peter's essential fineness had revived his faith in the goodness and kindliness in human nature. In a life where one could know a Peter, he thought, there must be beauty and a kind of beauty that Inez could neither find nor appreciate. ”

“ It was a heavenly night, with more than a hint of frost in the air, and the horses were as frolicsome as Prince.
"Now, will you tell me," asked Judith as she brought Buster back into the trail for the third time, "just why Charleton acted so?"
"It's just like I told you once," replied Douglas. "A man wants his own women to be straight no matter how much he does to make 'em crooked."
"Men are yellow," said Judith succinctly. "What's the use of Charleton—" She paused as if words failed her, and they rode their prancing horses in silence till John galloped up and pushed Beauty between them. ”

“ Douglas' voice was so honestly incredulous that Inez exclaimed resentfully:
"Am I so much worse than a lot of the kids at school?"
Douglas shrugged his shoulders and replied, "Judith's straight. I've kept her so."
Inez laughed. "Judith's straight because she's that kind of a girl. Why don't you watch your dad instead of Jude?"
Douglas' lips tightened and Inez studied his face in silence for a moment; then she went on, "Pretty fond of Jude, aren't you, Doug? Your father is a devil with women—that big, bossy, good-looking kind always is. I tell Jude so every time I see her." ”

“ Peter went on, with painful concentration on Douglas' blue eyes. "I hadn't known it, till this minute, Doug. I thought I was through. I'm fifty-six. God! Does life never finish with a man?" He laughed drearily. "Don't look at me like that, Douglas! You and I will never be rivals! This sort of thing can't undo me again. I swear it!"
He paced the room again, and once more paused before the young rider. "Not that I underestimate the strength of the thing. Who knows so well as I that love is the most powerful force in the world? Mind you, Doug, I make a sharp distinction between love and lust. ”

“ Lost Chief Range, on their right, was black against fire. The snow of the valley was as blue as indigo. A gentle but bitterly cold wind rose from the east. Prince, yelping, set off after a skulking coyote. When he had disappeared beyond a distant herd grazing through the snow, Judith pushed her horse up beside Buster.
"Doug, am I any scrappier than the rest of them?"
Douglas, his cigarette hanging negligently from a corner of his mouth, nodded.
"Well, I have to be, Doug," insisted Judith.
"No, you don't. You just look for trouble, all the time. Why do you have to be?" ”

“ Then he put out his hand to touch Judith's knee with infinite tenderness. "Couldn't you manage to fall in love with me, Jude dear? I'd stay your lover all my life."
Judith put her hand over Douglas' and her fine eyes were all that was womanly and soft as she answered, "O my dear, you don't know what you are talking about. What you promise is impossible."
"But how do you know, Judith? I am an unchanging sort of a chap. You realize that, don't you?"
Judith shook her head. "You don't know what you are promising. You can't force love to stay, once it has begun to fade." ”

“ Peter Knight's been all over the United States and he says there's no place passes it in beauty. Sometimes when I see the valley looking like it does to-night, I cry. Doug, you are more promising than these other kids. When you ride round on the range try to keep your mind a little bit off cattle and horses and women and keep it on that line of the Forest Reserve the way it looks to-night. Or the way this yellow wall looks in the snow and the sunrise on it. And then, when you get that habit, tell Judith about it and get her to thinking the same way. Beauty can't live on rot, Douglas. ”

“ John smacked Judith on the cheek. She threw herself on him like a fighting she-bear. John dropped his gun to seize her wrists and Mary promptly picked the weapon up and gave it to Douglas.
"Now," said Doug, when Judith stood panting like a young Diana, her eyes black with anger and excitement, "if you two men want to fight, take your fists and go to it!"
John suddenly grinned, his eyes on Judith. "I don't see anybody spoiling for a fist fight but Judith. You little lynx-cat! You get handsomer every day!"
"I'd hate to let a woman make putty of me like that," sneered Scott. ”

“ So had Oscar. You fought for over a year about that fool bull, first one of you branding it, then the other. You're young and you'd better give yourself up. You'll stand a better chance."
"Go ahead, Scott!" cried Judith. "I'll stand your friend like you did mine when I rode old Oscar's milch cow 'most to death!"
"Shut up, Jude!" exclaimed Douglas.
"Go ahead, Scott," John half smiled. "You needn't worry. You have a friend!"
"A friend won't do him much good, if he's guilty," grunted Charleton
Falkner.
"Anybody's better off for at least one friend," repeated Judith stoutly. ”

“ Judith loosened the bridle-chain and jumped once more into Sioux's saddle.
"Pull off his blindfold, Doug!" she cried.
"Nothing doing," returned Douglas succinctly. "You get off that bull,
Jude, before I take you off."
"I'm going to ride him up to the grandstand," said Judith between set teeth.
She whistled to Sioux and he lunged forward. Doug twisted his lariat. It coiled round one of the bull's hind legs. Doug brought his horse to its haunches.
"You get off that bull, Judith," he said. "You've put up the real show of the day. Be satisfied before you are killed. Sioux is almost crazy." ”

“ On past the Browns' noisy corral, past Falkner's brightly lighted cabin, and up the lifting trail to the Pass. The broken black line of the Pass, usually so clean-cut against the stars, looked wavering and uncertain. Douglas dropped forward and put his arms about the neck of the Moose.
Once in a while a horse is born with as much acumen as a mule plus the sensibility of a dog. The Moose, when he felt Doug's arms about his neck, dropped from a gallop to a trot and from a trot to a walk. Shortly, when Judith called, "Whoa-up, Moose!" ”

“ It'll be kind of lonesome."
"Lonesome!" Judith repeated the phrase as though it struck a familiar chord. "Life is lonesome, isn't it Doug! Seems as though I never dare to be myself any more, since Oscar's death. That was the first time I ever realized how lonely you can be."
Douglas nodded, his eyes full of an understanding that was pitiful. Youth should not be allowed to contemplate this sort of loneliness. It is soul searing. ”

“ But Lost Chief in winter was awe-inspiring in its naked splendor. Dead Line Peak and Falkner's Peak, barren save for the great blue snows and for the black shadows that crept up and down their tremendous flanks, were separated from each other by a long, narrow, slowly rising valley. Down this valley rushed a tiny brook whose murmur the bitterest weather could not quite still. Along this brook grew quivering aspens, and beside it coyotes kept open a little trail. Along this trail, Doug set his traps, as well as up on the wall of the mountains where lynx-cats and wolverine were hid. ”

“ Judith spun her lariat and a lusty young steer, well back toward the south fence, turned and stumbled. Swift sat back on her haunches, turned as she rose and leaped toward the dehorning corral. The bellowing steer was dragged backward, his left foot securely roped. He fell as they reached the gate and skidded helplessly on his side through the trampled yellow snow.
The men by the fire were ready. One of them perched on the steer's flank and freed the lariat, while another sat astride his neck and amidst a gush of blood sawed off the horns close to the head. ”

“ At heart, there's not an unhappier man than you, Falkner. Why? Because you have no belief in immortality."
"Great God, Fowler, how can I believe in it when I can't?" shouted
Charleton.
"Exactly! How can you?" returned Fowler, deliberately. "No foul-minded man ever yet had an ear for the word of the living God."
Charleton jumped to his feet. "What do you mean, you bastard cleric, you!"
"Aw, come off, Charleton!" exclaimed Douglas. "I've learned more dirt from you than I bet Judith ever has from Inez. Come on, let's go get the horses. Thanks for the grub, Mr. Fowler." ”

“ Where's a heroine like Judith?"
There was something so simple and so earnest in Doug's manner and voice that the red died out of Charleton's face and he said, "I'm with you on that point, Douglas."
"Peter told me once," Douglas went on, "that the Greek race was the finest in the world in their minds and their looks and in every way, until the Greek women got promiscuous. That as soon as that happened the race began to decay. And he said that there isn't a nation in the world any stronger than the virtue of its women."
"How old are you, Douglas?" asked Mr. Fowler. ”

“ Instantly Douglas melted. He put his arms about. Judith and drew her head to his shoulder. "O Jude! Don't! If I could only make you see it's my love for you makes me so mad!"
"You,—you don't want me to have any fun!" sobbed Judith. "How'd you like to be asked to give up everything yourself and stay home like a woman?"
"I wouldn't like it. But a regular girl oughtn't to want to do such things."
"Why not? I like horses and dogs and the wind on Fire Mesa just as much as you do. And dancing and hunting by moonlight and getting away with somebody else's cattle and all of it. I love it! ”

“ There was nothing tangible there to struggle against. One could neither fight nor urge indifference. Then he set his jaws. Judith should see! He knew whither he was going now. He had found the fine straight line of which Peter had spoken, long ago, and he would hew to it, at whatever cost. And Judith could not, must not fail him. If only he knew the things she really thought! His jaw was still set as he watched the little wild mare, now ceaselessly circling the corral fence, her face to the hills. Judith crossed to the bars and Douglas turned away. ”

“ Douglas patted her shoulder in silence. It was inexpressibly sweet to have her there.
"A girl has a brain, as well as a man," she went on. "She doesn't want to be just a servant to a rough old rancher. She wants to live by her brain as well as he does. What's the use of a woman being fine if that's all her fineness comes to? You can say she hands it on to her children. But she don't. It's something she acquires and it's lost—in the scrubbing pail."
Douglas listened with the whole of his mind. Judith's sobs had ceased now, and she went on, slowly. "It's not that I'm against children. ”

“ Wait! While Judith freezes to death too!" exclaimed Douglas.
"She couldn't freeze to death. She's too mad!" groaned John.
"An hour won't make any difference," urged Peter. "I guess Jude had this thing planned out."
"Planned!" Douglas' blue eyes burned. "She's gone off her head with anger and disgust and she doesn't care where she goes as long as she's rid of him. I know Jude!"
"You don't know Jude!" contradicted Peter. "Help me to lift John to the bunk. He's gat to be taken care of." ”

“ Judith, with heavy eyes and burning cheeks, looked from the mists to Douglas, who leaned on the fence and watched her.
"Jude," he said, "you are on the wrong foot. You ought to let whiskey and
Inez Rodman alone."
"Why don't you let 'em alone?" demanded Judith.
"It's different with a man!"
"O, don't give me that old stuff!" cried the girl. "We women do men's work in this valley. We'll have the men's kind of fun if we want it!"
"That's not the point," returned Douglas. "Women have to pay a price the men don't and that's all there is to it."
"It's not fair! It's not fair! I hate the world! ”